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It is time again for me to reflect on what I think are my 12 best photos of 2012. These are the photos that have special meaning to me in some way, either the exhilaration of being there and seeing the vista/subject in front of me and bringing home the memory in the photo, or being touched by the composition in some way. As is true to form, most of the photos were taken at sunrise or sunset, the photographer’s favorite light. In this one blog post I will try to give a bit of background for each image as well as technical details. So, in essence, I am committing to providing 12 blog posts in this one post, that I should have written last year.

1. Well, I started last year’s list with photos from Blackwater Falls State Park in West Virginia, and here I am with my favorite photo from very near there – Dolly Sods Wilderness Area. The goal here on this sunrise image was to capture some of the rocks called Bear Rocks in the foreground with also the layers formed by the Allegheny Mountains in the Appalachian mountain chain. A lesson learned from this trip — the third week in June marks the longest days of the year and therefore requires a very early rise, about 3:15AM, to get to the wilderness area and get set up for sunrise. I staked out this location early, liking the cradle formed by the foreground rocks and the diagonal division of the mid-ground between the slope and the distant layers, topped by the pinks and mauves of the sunrise . I waited until the sun had risen high enough to catch it right on the edge of the slope with the aperture set to f/22 to make a starburst pattern. And I love the first lines of sunlight on the tops of the trees. Technical details: Canon 5D Mark II, Canon EF17-40mm f/4L USM lens at 32mm, 1/10 seconds at f/22, ISO 100; on a tripod.

2. This photo of Richmond Virginia skyline at night was taken in late August. I was pleased with several photos captured from the Floodwall, but I particularly like this one which has an other-worldly feel to it with the starbursts on the lamp post lights. To get this effect I used an aperture of f/18. I have been asked if I used a star filter, but I did not – this is how it came out of the camera. I also made extensive use of Live View in order to manually focus to the level of sharpness in this photo. With the darkness on the Floodwall it was hard to judge the correct exposure, and to be truthful I wasn’t entirely sure I achieved capturing all the color from the various lights in and on the buildings until I got home and could see the image larger than the small LCD screen on the back of my camera. Technical details: Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 24-105mm f/4L IS lens at 40mm, 13 seconds at f/18, ISO 400; on a tripod.

3. I signed up for a photo “shoot-off” in early January with fellow members of the Charlottesville Photography Initiative. All participants learn the subject of the shoot off at 10AM, and the challenge is to shoot, process and upload three photos to the website by 5PM the same day. The photos must be taken within that window of time. January’s challenge was “White”, so I made a list of white things. For some reason I kept thinking of these white bowls that I had recently purchased, and of soap suds. The overall look I wanted would be “high key”, white on white. So I set up outside with a lid from a plastic storage box as a base, white foam core as a background, and a pan of water to pour into the bowls to create the soap suds from liquid detergent. Then came the hard part. I set up my camera on a tripod, and with my remote shutter release in one hand and the pan of water in the other hand I had to coordinate pressing the shutter release while pouring the water while standing behind the white foam core. I discovered that I had difficulty pressing the shutter release button while pouring! I probably took over 100 images before finally settling on this one. Although I do not have a steady stream of water down into the bowls, I loved the little splash created as I overfilled the bowls in this image. My results: Second place in the shoot-off, and first place for “Marvelously Mundane” assigned category of the Charlottesville Camera Club April contest. Technical details: Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 24-105mm f/4L IS lens at 84mm, 1/2000 second at f/8, ISO 320; on a tripod.

4. In April I was fortunate to be traveling about Ireland again photographing new sites for Megalithicireland.com. But I took one night to join Dave McKane’s free Dusk Shoot in Dublin. We met at Sean O’Casey Bridge and quickly scattered from there to be able to catch the “blue moment” while we could. I stopped on the south side of the River Liffey just over the bridge to capture this moment. I would have liked to stop on the bridge to get a better balance, but the bridge swayed with every person crossing and a long exposure would have been blurred. For the left side of the image I was interested in capturing the lines formed by the river wall and reflection, railing, and decorative lamps on lampposts that converge at a vanishing point. I also waited until cars were traveling towards me on City Quay before opening the shutter to be able to include light trails as part of those lines. The river reflections and the skyline in the distance make up the right side of the image. The boat was an added bonus, but with a 6 second exposure it is not as tack sharp I would have liked because it moved in the flowing current. I also like the cool blues of the water, buildings and sky contrasted against the warm oranges cast by the street lights. I had hoped to get great images of the Customs building that night, but as you can see in this photo, the lights were not turned on for the dome. Technical details: Canon EOS 40D, Sigma 10-20mm F/4-5.6 at 20mm, 6 seconds at f/22, ISO 100; on a tripod.

5. The Magnolia Plantation and Gardens in Charleston South Carolina provided so many photographic opportunities in late March, just as the azaleas reached peak bloom, I am finding it hard to pick just one image. I created a gallery on the website featuring 82 images that could be on this list. This image was shot through hanging spanish moss to give a bit of a ghostly image The design of the gardens are fantastic and on this early morning the sky was overcast which cut out shadows and saturated the colors. The water in this small pond was also quite still providing a nice reflection and creating a circle with the bright pink azaleas around the white bush. Technical details: Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 70-300mm f/4L IS USM lens at 110mm, 0.4 second at f/32, ISO 100; on a tripod.

6. While I was in Charleston South Carolina I had traveled across the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge several times and knew there should be an image in there somewhere. It is a very long bridge, and so I went on to google earth to try to locate a safe place to photograph it from. I was on my own, and not that familiar with the city and would not know how to distinguish a safe area from one not as safe, but I found a park that looked like it would have a place to view the bridge. I used my gps navigation from google on my phone to get there, but the road had clearly changed and I could not make the left turn where the voice navigation told me to turn. But I found the park and wandered back behind it to get a good vantage point. Problem was that I was there far too early to capture the lights on the bridge, and the sunset was not that spectacular. So I had to wait for at least another half hour, and realized just how cold it can be after the sun goes down in March. Gradually as the sky darkened to the dusky blue moment I could finally make out the glow of the lights on the bridge supports. It was then that I realized my luck. I knew that Jupiter would be in the sky in close proximity to Venus and the Moon, but I didn’t realize that they would be directly above the bridge. Although I couldn’t make out Venus, I do have both the moon and Jupiter in this shot. I also like the unusual structure under the bridge. It added an extra “anchor” for this image. Technical details: Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 24-105mm f/4L IS USM lens at 105mm, 13 seconds at f/20, ISO 100; on a tripod.

7. For my 7th pick I go back to the Dolly Sods Wilderness in West Virginia. This image was almost not made. This was my second morning up in the wilderness area and once again standing on the Bear Rocks to look out over the Allegheny Mountains. I made several good images of the rising sun over the distant layers as I moved about the rocky terrace, and just when I was about to go I looked to my left from the rock I was standing on. There was the rock that I had in my mind for this photograph, right at my feet. I quickly re-composed and captured this moment of beautiful golden sky and starburst sun contrasted against the steely-blue cast on the still shaded rocks, with just a kiss of sunlight touching them. Technical details: Canon 5D Mark II, Canon EF17-40mm f/4L USM lens at 17mm, 1/8 seconds at f/22, ISO 100; on a tripod.

8. In mid October I headed to the Delaware Water Gap National Park that straddles the Delaware River in Pennsylvania and New Jersey for what I hoped would be peak fall foliage color. I was not disappointed and here I had a slight career “course correction” as I discovered my joy in capturing color in small, more intimated landscapes. I have so many images from that trip that really speak to me as an artist that I have difficulty limiting it to just one or two. This image was captured shortly after sunrise while the mist still lay on the still Hidden Lake surface. The color is just glorious.
Technical details: Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 70-300 f/4.5-5.6 IS USM lens at 105mm, 1/6 second at f/11, ISO 100; on a tripod.

9. This image was also taken in the Delaware Water Gap at a pond on the campus of PEEC (Poconos Envirnomental Education Center). It was taken near sunset, but unfortunately the sky was overcast and not casting as strong as reflections as it would have if the sun were shining on the reflected trees. But this is an example of working with what you have because the reflected tree foliage provides just enough contrast in this image to not overpower the other colors in the scene, and the lines formed by bare tree trunks are an equally strong subject. I focused on the leaves which were so brilliantly distributed throughout the scene. Technical details: Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 70-300 f/4.5-5.6 IS USM lens at 120mm, 0.6 seconds at f/10, ISO 100; on a tripod.

10. What I like about this photo the most is the light – although the sun and sky are obscured in this image, the backlighting through the leaves brings such life to the scene! This is an often shot image, maybe even overshot, but I hope this image evokes a feeling of magical light. Taken at the Magnolia Gardens and Plantation in Charleston South Carolina, this is my representation of Oak Alley. Technical details: Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 24-105mm f/4L IS USM lens at 92mm, 1/6 second at f/20, ISO 100; on a tripod.

11. I have way too many photos from my two+ trips to Ireland this past year to include in this list. But I thought I should at least reserve my last two spots for Ireland. Since each trip was over 3 weeks long, I have scores of castles, villages, megalithic structures, lighthouses, medieval abbey ruins, scenic vistas, rocky cliffs and seaports, dolphins, horses, sheep, cows and even bar patrons to include here. I haven’t even posted them all to my website gallery since I think I need to break down that gallery into smaller ones. This image was captured just before sunset after a long drive from Dublin to Valencia Island in County Kerry. It was an overcast day, and we had no idea if there would be photograph worth taking when we travelled on to the Cromwell Point Lighthouse just before the sun would set. Driving down a steep hill on a very narrow paved track (the pavement had been scored to help retain traction on the severity of the slope) we could see the light house in the distance. As we approached the photographer’s dream came true – the sun, so close to the horizon, managed to slip some rays under that heavy cloud cover and light up both a rock on the side of the road and the lighthouse. It was a scramble out of the car and over to this rock to try to get a composition before losing the light. Again, the light makes this image special. Technical details: Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 24-105mm f/4L IS USM lens at 65mm, 1/125 second at f/23, ISO 1000; handheld.

12. For some reason I want to end my list with this photo of sheep at Carrowkeel in County Sligo. This photo represents so much of the Irish terrain and country life. Ireland has abundant mountain ranges, many of which are without trees but instead look much like this, with so much exposed rock, and sheep. This photo was taken from a car window, and I was so close to her, eye to eye from my car seat, that I moved ever so slowly to capture this. I had to use a large aperture, limiting depth of field, because it was an overcast day in winter with limited light. I am so glad I held her attention long enough to get this photo. Technical details: Canon 5D Mark II, Canon 24-105mm f/4L IS USM lens at 95mm, 1/80 second at f/6.3, ISO 400; handheld.

Thank you for looking, and please visit my website at www.debsnelsonphotography.com for more images. I wish I could have saved more space for the Ireland images – please be sure to check out that gallery. If you have created a “Best of 2012” list please post a link to your list in my comments!